Thiswill be very difficult for most to believe, but is true. During the last yearsof my overseas life I researched to find an efficient model for the fastsocio-economic development of my native state Kerala and my motherland India. Thus I came across the‘Porto Alegre Innovation’ in Participatory Budgeting (PB). Because of theholistic, balancing, innovative, self-evaluating and continuously improvingelements built into this systematic yearly cyclic process, ‘Porto AlegreInnovation’ is much more than PB. It is now a time tested process forComprehensive, Equitable and Sustainable Socio-economic Development in anycountry. As the merits of Porto Alegre Innovation made PB world-famous, PB isnow adapted in about 40 countries including Argentina, Chile, Ecuador, Mexico,Canada, England, France, Germany, USA etc. England declared PB as thenational strategy for development in March 2008. But it is the simple PB thatis copied, not the very systematic and efficient Porto Alegre style Innovative PB! Onereason for this is that the language of the Brazilian city of Porto Alegre is Portuguese andEnglish is not popular there. Another reason is the fact that the innovative PBis complex and the details thereof are not available even on the websites and theliterature on the subject. Thru intensive efforts, I collected most of thedetails. Porto Alegre’s Innovative PB is thesolution for Kerala, India and even for the wholeworld!

Porto Alegre’sInnovative PB is a ward-wise decentralised process for prioritised development ofinfrastructure alone. Local residents meet separately in several small and twomajor assemblies in the 16 wards, discuss and prioritise thru voting, three infrastructureitems from a list of 12 items, pre-selected by experts. In 1994, five infrastructureitems were selected to be prioritised for the whole city. An importantinnovative step after prioritisation by the residents is the use of a verysmart formula to calculate the equitable share of each prioritised infrastructurefor each ward. This made the development equitable thru out the city. As fundswere short, the PB process used only about 5 percent of the city's budget forinfrastructure development at the beginning. Another important element of Porto Alegre’s PB is the election oftwo each Councillors of Participatory Budgeting (COP) from each of the 16 wardsfor one year, with a revocable mandate! This COP together with the mayor’sexecutives and the city council finalise the budget, and publish it as InvestmentPlan Document. The COP also supervises the development projects. Because of itsdecentralised and localised, yearly cyclic and evolving nature, this process issuitable for villages, towns and cities in any country. The process started in Porto Alegre and improved inefficiency thru trial and error method. The most surprising result is theexcellent and comprehensive socio-economic development thru equitabledevelopment of infrastructure alone. If the process evolved and developeditself, and developed the city as well in 12 years, smaller villages, towns andcities could be developed much faster. Because of its innovative elements andvery high efficiency, this PB process became famous as ‘Porto Alegre Innovation’.

Lessons from Brazil: In the Brazilian cityof Porto Alegre, a very effective and innovative PBprocess was implemented from 1989 thru 2004 by the Workers Party Mayors. In the2004 city election, the Brazilian Democratic Movement Party candidate Mr. JoséFogaça became mayor. During his rule from 2004 to 2008, only 38 percent of thePB prioritised projects were completed; during 16 years of Workers Party ruleit did 82 percent of PB prioritised projects. Mr. José Fogaça introducedPublic-Private-Participation (PPP), parallel to PB. Even though PB activistsare unhappy with this, Mr. José Fogaça won a 2^nd term on a secondrun off on 26 Oct 2008 election, after he missed clear majority on the 5 Oct2008 regular election. This happened because the Brazilian gov’t could not legitimisethe PB process thru legislation. Thus it is at the mercy of the ruling party. Eventhough the highly successful socio-economic development process evolved inPorto Alegre and accepted by many countries, various versions of PB is adaptedin only about 275 villages, towns, cities and one state in Brazil itself. Thisproves that the mutually accusing and perpetually swaying normal politicalprocess will be very slow to recognise and implement even the best process,thereby delaying and preventing fast socio-economic development. It also showsthat even when smart processes are implemented, manipulations induced byselfish motives and subjective perceptions will creep in. Like many cityresidents, Roberto Oliveira, president of the Vila São Judas NeighbourhoodAssociation blames Mayor Fogaça for the process’ “half-dead, semi-vegetativestate.” (See: Participatory democracy,Brazil-style, is running into problems’ by Michael Fox on the website: http://www.participatorybudgeting.org/.)

Lessons from India: Gandhiji’s idea of ‘Gram Swaraj’ or village autonomy thrudecentralisation and empowerment of local self-governments is implied in theIndian constitution of 1950. As it was not implemented seriously, to makedecentralisation more effective, 73^rd and 74^th amendmentsto the constitution (Panchayati Rajand Nagarapalika Acts) were made in1992. More than fifteen years after that, decentralisation is still notefficiently implemented in Indian states. Where implemented, it is ineffectivethru the lack of distribution of funds, functions and functionalities essentialthereto, parallel schemes of the Indian central and state gov’t etc.

In1996, the Indian state Kerala’s Communist led coalition gov’t initiated ‘Peoples’ Planning’ as a decentralisation initiative. But it apparently had two serious problems: 1. planning by people will be highly defective and almostimpractical and as such the concept was wrong. It was gradually neglected and no more intensively practiced now. 2. The programme was allegedly misused by some elements of the leading coalition partner of the state government, the Communist party of India (Marxist) - to divert funds into other channels or misuse it.

In 1999 the Indian NGO, Association for Democratic Reform (ADR) filed a PublicInterest Litigation (PIL) in the Delhi High Court requesting provisions forcandidates contesting elections to national/state parliaments to declare theirassets, educational qualifications and criminal antecedents if any. The court issued a judgement in favour of ADR. Soon the parliament concocted an ordinanceallowing the candidates to evade declaration of the information, and passed itas Act 77 of 2002. The NGOs Lok Satta,PUCL and ADR challenged this thru another PIL, and after prolonged legalstruggle the Indian Supreme Court gave the verdict on 13 March 2003, that people have the constitutional right toinformation on the candidates for whom they may vote in a public election.

For years, hundreds of central and state gov’t sponsored and/or funded development schemesare running in India like Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana, Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Developmentscheme, JawaharlalNehru irrigation scheme, IndiraAwaas Yojana, Rajiv Gandhi Udyami Mitra Yojana, Dr. Ambedkar Samajik SamtaKendra Yojana, Parivar Mulak Ikai Sthapna Yojna etc (See http://india.gov.in/govt/schemes.php).But as once revealed by a gov’t study and mentioned by deceased Indian PMRajive Gandhi, only less than 10 percent of the benefits of central schemesreach the poor and needy and/or the deserving community. There are towns inKerala with more than 20 kinder gardens where half of them are without enoughchildren to be legitimate. They are maintained as the funds are from the centre,and will be lost unless misused like this!

Two Indian success stories: 1. The Indian state Andhra Pradesh introduced IT toolsand Social Audit for the administration of India Gov’t National EmploymentGuarantee Act in 2008. They engaged educated youth to manage these. All theilliterate and semiliterate unskilled labourers who were employed under thescheme got paid within two weeks of their employment! (www.hindu.com/2008/09/08/stories/2008090856271000.htm).

2. In April 2007, theIndian state Maharashtra introduced community-based monitoring component to theNational Rural Health Mission started in 2005. Soon institutional deficienciescame to light and could be rectified. (www.hindu.com/2008/09/11/stories/2008091155361100.htm).

These lessons form Brazil and India, prove that perpetual watch of the civil society andsocial pressure are inevitable for the effective implementation of the best provisionsand processes, even when made part of the constitution. It also shows that centrallymanaged projects will cause wastage and abuse of resources.

India is world’s most diverseand complex country; its development is a very difficult task; only world’sbest process can achieve that. It will involve many steps to achieve the goal;but until all the right steps are complete in the right manner, no goal can be fullyachieved. The Porto Alegre PB process made excellent results and proved veryeffective. It is the panacea for comprehensive and equitable socio-economicdevelopment of any country. Today, for 95 percent of world’s problems, thereare several solutions. In our age of information and communication, it is onlya matter of searching, finding and CAREFUL implementation. Copying is an easy,quick, economical and a very efficient way of replication. Computers, cars,Jumbo-jets and even human beings are copies. Copies better than the original arealso possible! But two points are decisive in copying: 1. Important elements shouldnot be dropped out at all, on minor excuses, and 2. Essential adaptationsshould be made to make the scheme feasible in a different situation.

What can be done to make the decisive features and precise details of ‘Porto AlegreInnovation’ in Participatory Budgeting, an integral part of the socio-economic developmentprocesses in India?

Suggestion:1. Citizens should be made aware that India’s fast development ispossible and not that difficult. Because of poverty, lack of education,knowledge, opportunity etc, the majority of Indians do not know this, and manycannot believe this fact. Therefore, it is important that the information isspread thru various media. 2. A ‘Public Interest Litigation’ to incorporate thedecisive features and precise details of Porto Alegre Innovation inParticipatory Budget into Panchayati Raj Actis inevitable. The fast socio-economic development needed in India can be achieved only ifsuch a super-smart process is practiced in all villages, towns and citiessimultaneously – there is no time to waste now! 3. Local NGOs and the civilsociety should press on the village, town and city authorities, to adapt the Porto Alegre style PB process.

After all the above measures, the civil society and NGOs must still maintain a very vigilantand perpetual watch on politics and bureaucracy to prevent manipulations,exploitations etc. The patriotic civil society should press on the politicalclass to implement these and abide by the rules. Indian parliament enacted the Panchayati Raj Act in 1992, fordevolution of power to local self government institutions in Indian states. Butit is still not implemented uniformly and effectively by the central and stategovernments. Porto Alegre Innovation transformed the city and became worldfamous. But the innovative process is side-lined in that city itself by themayor of another party! These lessons prove the weak and swaying nature of peopleand politics! This confirms the urgency and inevitability of social pressureand perpetual vigil on politics and bureaucracy, by the civil society.

India has elected a newparliament in a mammoth general election process on five days during 16 April thru 13 May 2009, spending about Rs.100,000 million ($2 billion). Thisis more than the $1.8 billion spent in last year’s US election. Indianelection 2009 was world’s largest democratic process involving about 714million voters and 828,000 polling stations! The average assets of the new Indianparliamentarian amounts to Rs. 50 million, as per their statements submitted tothe election commission. As per the Dr. Arjun Sengupta commission report in2007, 836 million Indians survive on a mere Rs. 20 or less a day! The newparliamentarians are entrusted with the responsibility of making the lives ofthese poor and vulnerable, worth living! A free and fair election by the peopleis only the first step in representative democracy. Whether the representativeswill keep their promises and what they deliver is another story!